New Nintendo Handheld: Should We Wait Two Years?

DualShockers writes, "Lately, rumors have been swirling around about a new Nintendo handheld. They're talking about how powerful it will be and what the system will look like. They are also suggesting that it may be coming as soon as by the end of this year. This is where my biggest concern lies, should I wait or not? It has only happened with the past two generations of Nintendo handhelds, and certainly two doesn't equal a trend, but it definitely has me wondering..."

If the new DS was only a small improvement (like the jump from a DS Lite to a DSi) then I would definitely wait, but it sounds like the difference between the next DS and the current models is going to be huge, so I bet a lot of people will buy one without hesitation.

I think it's the way to keep your handheld selling for a long time before you can release a completely new handheld. I don't think we can blame Nintendo or Sony, I will buy the first model if I have the money and I will sell the first model and buy the second if I am interested on it.

This applies to pretty much everything. I bought my PS3 on launch, same with my 360, my PSP-1000 and my DS. 2-3 years after I buy my PS3, the slim is announced for half the price (w/o BC though) and half the size; around the same time, I bought a new 360 due to reliability issues and HDD (took an elite); I have replaced my DS by a Lite and replaced the latter by a DSi late last year; and for the PSP, I replaced it for a 2000 (which I still own) and a Go, all of these were bought for a lesser price than their original form (cept for the Go...) and came with major improvements.

Sure, when the next DS or the next PSP for that matter, arrives on the market, you can skip it hoping to get the next version, but in the end, you'll still get "screwed" as there will likely be a third and a fourth version of it, and if you wait for the last one, you'll also be missing on years of entertainment and possibly some of the best games available for the system (finding Nocturne and DDS 1 and 2 was much easier at release than years later on eBay...)

true, but i think thats different. Video games dont come out as often as iPods or lets just go as broad as a computer. with the gameboy in retrospect, the obvious choice was to wait for the SP, and again with the DS and DS lite, not so much with the DSi though.

well its truly up to the buyer. as for me i try to get as many handheld and tech as i can. of course it be a waste of money but for those who truly are tech freaks it wouldnt matter. i like collecting things so handheld is just another thing to collect

I think this pretty much holds true. usually the first year or 2 of a console/platform isnt all that glorious to start with, and I agree with the article. a week after i bought my GBA, the SP was announced. I was a little hot to say the least.

I am not waiting . Sure there would always be some cheaper version with better battery of a portable down the line , but it's hardly my concern .

Unless you've got other priorities , dont care , or already got a too big amount of unfinished and unplayed backlog of games , you just jump right in . Bare of course some notorious hardware flaws obviously .

In the case of the DS , i do not regret sticking with the original DS rather than the following ones . For starters i never agreed with the DSi losing the gba slot . Given their ridiculous profit , their cost going down massively , there were no reason other than greed for Nintendo to substract feature instead of adding all of them .

I am also not fond of the new buttons circa DS lite . Maybe it's the habit , but i didnt felt at ease when touching a dsl lite's button after so much time with the big fella .

Anywya back to the point .... waiting years for a new cheaper version of a console isnt worth missing out the game released for it meanwhile IMHO.

I think it's a tough decision to know when you got it, but I try my best not to let it upset me when new tech comes along. Then again there's always the prospect of selling your model everytime a new SKU comes out, I've started to do that recently with a certain platform that seems to hold its value so much that I keep getting the latest and greatest "free". Obviously this isn't gonna work out with every platform though. Hm....

I think Nintendo bring out more versions of their handhelds than Britney has comebacks. I see they have gone back to the original DS with this latest XL model. It is nice but if you've just paid out the cash for a DSi and then this comes along.

One thing that Nintendo have proved though is that the general gaming populace are suckers. Loyalty, gimmicks but the main improvements are at a cost. They're trying to beat the PS2 record though so you can't blame them.

If Nintendo releases one with motion sensing capabilities, would that be the ultimate "I have to have this." for you guys? Personally I think that would do it for me. I also wonder what Sony has in store for the successor to PSP which is said to be happening/not happening depending on who you talk to. It should be a very interesting turn of events, many possibilities.

why? because the Nintendo DSI xl is coming out I think nintendo fans will eventually backlash with enough nintendo small upgrades. The next handheld should be the same one you can buy at its release as when its life cycle ends years later. Putting the XL and another handheld in the same year is just too much.